New Jersey Man Busted Cloning Credit Cards in a Hotel Room

A Spring Valley, New Jersey, man was arrested on several fraud charges after buying stolen credit card numbers from vendors on the darknet and then writing the numbers to magnetic strips of blank cards. His arrest, like that of another recent fraudster using stolen identities and credit cards, occurred at a hotel where he had been staying under a false ID and using a stolen credit card.

Davidson Gilot, 26, allegedly checked into a hotel in Mahwah, New Jersey, only a night prior to his July 12 arrest. When he checked into the hotel on July 11, police Chief James Batelli explained to the press, the hotel clerk had accepted his ID and credit card without any problems. Or without reporting any to the police.

Chief Batelli explained that Gilot then entered his room and worked on his so-called âcomplex scam.â The scam itself, really, is far from complex to anyone familiar with the work of fraudsters. But to some police forces, the darknet, bitcoin, and magnetic card encoders (or magstripe writers) are foreign concepts that only make appearances in federal cases or international law enforcement operations.

In the room, according to the police, Gilot set up a card reader, a magstripe writer, and a device that makes physical imprints on plastic cards. He had fake driver licenses that matched the identity of the original owner of the credit card. He brought blank credit cards to the hotel for the obvious purpose of writing credit card information to the magnetic strips on the back of the card. He had additionally brought blank cards he had obtained from real financial institutions such as banks and credit card agencies.

The Chief said that Detective Sgt. Kevin Hebert and Detective Michael Grassi, with the assistance of banks and financial institutions, had launched an investigation into the financial fraud. The crime that had taken place in the hotel room needed little further investigation. Other parts of the case, such as how the credit card numbers of individuals with members at New Jersey and Ohio banks ended up for sale on the dark web.

Inside the room, Gilot allegedly extracted as much information as possible from a card number using his card reader. With his gathered information, he wrote the card number to the magnetic strip of either a blank card or a bank card from an established financial institution. The blank cards from New Jersey and Ohio banks obviously received card numbers from individuals who used the banks in question. The police did not specify which banks Gilot had targeted.

At the time of his arrest, Gilot had allegedly “cloned” only credit cards. He needed more time to clone additional cards. So he attempted to pay for a second night’s stay at the hotel. The second stay required credit card verification and the card verification failed. The hotel manager called the police and an arrest was made.

Police charged Gilot with one count of possessing two or more credit card blanks; one count of forgery; one count of possession of a card press; one count of possession of a credit scanning device; and one count of marijuana possession.